Emotiva XDA3 DAC/preamp
The marketing line ‘why pay more?’ is as old as retailing itself but, for the longest time, it hasn’t prevented audiophiles answering quite reasonably: ‘above a certain level, small improvements start to cost a lot’. The law of diminishing returns has been a thorny fact of life for hi-fi owning music lovers with high end aspirations and, in the grand scheme of things, it remains as inescapable as ever.
But, just as nature finds a way, canny manufacturers have found purpose and profit in working the idea and, over the past handful of years, have given the undeniably attractive notion of ‘affordable high end’ (aka ‘budget exotica’) a real shot in the arm, raising value for money to hitherto unprecedented heights while putting the onus on big ticket hardware to prove it isn’t wearing the emperor’s new clothes. Sounds like a healthy state of affairs to me.
Perhaps nowhere has the perceived performance gap between the truly great and the aspiring good been shrunk more rapidly or dramatically than in the realm digital to analogue conversion, and the enabler here has undoubtedly been the cut-throat rivalry between DAC chip manufacturers such as ESS Technologies, AKM, Burr-Brown (now owned by Texas Instruments), Cirrus Logic (Wolfson) et al, not to mention the sound quality challenge posed to these delta-sigma types by the resistor based R2R ladder DACS favoured by numerous brands. A lot rests on the skill of the application, especially in the analogue domain, but in a race to the top, it seems consumers can’t lose.
And it can’t help but oil the wheels of a company like Nashville-based Emotiva whose stated mission on the value trail is to work smarter and get to the right destination via the most direct path. Before he started the company, President and CEO Dan Laufman was an OEM supplier to some of the industry’s biggest hitters and observed what he considered to be manufacturing inefficiencies in the system that contributed to price escalation and diluted value for money. He thought he could do better and, to cut a long story short, Emotiva is the result.
So, when Emotiva describes the XDA3 as a fully balanced, fully differential, reference quality DAC that also has preamp functionality with a digitally controlled analogue ladder volume control (which means the analogue inputs have a fully analogue signal path and are never converted into digital), it’s a fair bet Emotiva is daring items twice, even three times the price to do better. It’s hard to see where they could. As well as the balanced XLR inputs and outputs, the XDA3 has two coaxial and two optical digital inputs, an HDMI ARC input for HD streaming from a TV or projector plus a high-quality headphone stage.
Star of the show, of course, is the DAC which uses twin ESS ES9038Q2M SABRE32 reference chips, supporting up to 32-bit/768Hz PCM and offering DoP support up to DoP 256 and native DSD up to DSD512. It all lives in a slim, full-width, all-metal chassis and jacket fronted by a thick, machined aluminium facia sporting a quite small but hi-vis blue OLED display. And, round the back, there’s enough space to give the plugs and ports a bit of breathing space. Build and finish are respectively solid and neat which also applies to the well-featured machined aluminium remote – again examples of Emotiva’s commitment to the idea of honest, well executed, only-the-necessary engineering rather than eye-catching frills and baubles.
Get-a-load-of-this
As I already own a 150 Watt per channel Emotiva A-300 power amp, finding the muscle to partner the XDA3 isn’t a stretch. And goodness me, with Russell K Red 50 SE speakers at the business end, what a potent pairing it makes. No slow-burn, you’ll-like-me-when-you-know-me transactional posturing here. With all that familial firepower to do its bidding, the XDA3 is an instant, get-a-load-of-this, high-achiever. Steered by the XDA3’s DAC and preamp, the combo has a well organised and decently scaled presentation with exceptional clarity and grip, strong powers of analysis, wide and deftly weighted dynamics and punchy, taut and nicely textured bass.
With Primare’s excellent NP5 Prisma Mk2 streaming transport plugged in via the Toslink optical input, listening to a 24/96kHz Qobuz stream of jazz singer and bassist Esperanza Spalding’s affectingly atonal and angular Good Lava from her album Emily’s D+Evolution through the XDA3/A-300 after a talented and far pricier super-integrated/outboard DAC of repute (I’ll save the blushes) is sobering to say the least, the Emotiva duo delivering the track’s quirky swagger and jagged gait with more colour and confidence, not to mention raw presence and drive.
Switching to vinyl and Susan’s House from Eels 1996 debut album Beautiful Freak, the XDA3 preamp’s analogue line input makes a decent fist of a high-quality feed from a Rega Planar 6/Ania Pro MC turntable and cartridge and Tom Evans phono stage with a more palpable and juicy in-the-room sound from the usually leaner Rega/Tom Evans collaboration. Naim fans might even be impressed with the grasp of pace, rhythm and timing. This and believably judged stereo perspectives that extend way beyond the placement of the Red 50 SEs (admittedly great facilitators in this respect) if they’re given some breathing space, and possess plenty of air and a degree of well-defined depth dimensionality. A righteous union if ever there was.
If team Emotiva is a little short on warmth and romance, it more than makes amends with its clarity and dynamic skills, disproving the notion that you need a toasty presentation to be able to listen for hours on end without fatigue. Low distortion and the absence of large tonal aberrations are, perhaps, the more likely enablers. Another key asset is the way the XDA3 avoids sounding slightly mechanical, as budget-priced kit sometimes can, and allows the music to ebb and flow fluently and cohesively.
As for the dedicated headphone amp, it’s certainly transparent and powerful enough to do justice to my ageing pair of HiFiMan HE 400 S open back planar magnetic cans. They’ve never been graced with the juiciest or most propulsive bass, but low frequencies are nonetheless agile, tuneful and articulate.
In terms of low colouration, finely rendered high frequencies, whip-crack timing and a powerful sense of cohesion that lets the music roll in a lucid, free-flowing manner – all is present and correct. The spare and languid grace of Brazilia, a hi-res download from Robert Len’s exquisite Fragile album, is skilfully captured while the ‘all areas’ orchestral exuberance of Overture from a Qobuz stream of the Whiplash soundtrack has all the snap, sparkle and timing precision cinema’s grumpiest band leader, Terence Fletcher, could wish for. The piece sounds so together it might even elicit a grudging crack of an approving smile. So, overall, no complaints.
Conclusion
All right, reality check. The Emotiva XDA3’s broad-based capabilities, while considerable, don’t scale the heights of kit that might be considered ‘true high end’ but then, they don’t claim to and don’t need to. For the money, they’re much better than they need to be and, in the world of true hi-fi bargains, that’s more than enough, especially if you just want to kick back and enjoy a broad spectrum of music as cost-efficiently as possible. The XDA3, whatever you team it with, most certainly won’t get in your way.